Summary | |
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I am a postdoctoral researcher at Carnegie Mellon University, Department of Psychology.
My academic interests span computational linguistics and cognitive science. Specifically, I focus on multi-agent cognition; specifically communication. I employ data-driven computational methods to answer questions in psycholinguistics, for instance about syntactic priming and alignment in spoken dialogue. I use small- and large-scale cognitive simulation (e.g., with ACT-R) to model learning and adaptation in human subjects, specifically during interaction between pairs and larger groups. I am familiar with computational and statistical models, but also do experimental work.
I completed my PhD in Cognitive Science from the School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh under Johanna Moore and Frank Keller. My PhD thesis investigates structural priming and alignment effects in human-human dialogue. Using large corpora and linear modeling techniques I demonstrate the relationship between success in dialogue and a simple tendency to repeat linguistic decisions at the lexical/syntactic level. The methodology developed to measure priming is used to determine architectural properties of the comprehension and production apparatus, in particular with respect to hierarchical structure, and flexible incrementality of syntactic processing. This leads to a model of natural language production using a standard cognitive architecture, which can explain syntactic priming as lexical learning effect. I hold a Diplom in linguistics from Potsdam, Germany and an MSc in computer science from University College Dublin, Ireland. I have worked on multimodal human-computer interaction during a two-year Research Fellowship at MIT Media Lab Europe. (See: Publications.) Previously, I designed a natural language understanding service at a dot.com. On the side, I used to work as a radio journalist and at a dot.com company in Berlin, Germany. I created and continue to lead the free software project Aquamacs Emacs. I'm a keen glider pilot and photographer. Contact: David Reitter, Carnegie Mellon University. E-mail | |
Education |
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2008
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PhD (Cognitive Science) University of Edinburgh, School of Informatics, Institute for Communicative and Collaborative Systems Advisors: Johanna Moore and Frank Keller Examiners: Dan Jurafsky (Stanford) Examiners: Mark Steedman (Edinburgh) Funding award: The Edinburgh-Stanford Link |
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2004
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MSc. (Computer
Science)
National University Ireland, University College Dublin, Department of Computer Science, Ireland Thesis: Hybrid Planning and
Realization of Coherent Utterances for Multimodal Natural Language
Dialogue Systems.
Advisor: Fred Cummins |
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2003
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Diplom in Computational
Linguistics
University of Potsdam, Germany With distinction Thesis:
Rhetorical Analysis with Support Vector Machines.
(Best Thesis Award of the Society for Computational Linguistics and Language Technology, Germany, 2003) Advisor: Manfred Stede
(Potsdam) |
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1997
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German Abitur
(with distinction)
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1995
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U.S. High School
Diploma
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Career in Academia and IT |
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08/2008–
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Postdoctoral Researcher
Cognitive Science, Department of Psychology, Carnegie Mellon University |
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09/2002
–10/2004
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Research
Fellow
MIT Media Lab Europe (MLE) Dublin, Ireland EU Project
“Flexible and Adaptive Spoken Language and Multimodal
Interfaces (FASiL)”: Developed a multimodal and natural
language generation approach using Multimodal Functional
Unification Grammar to model cross-modal coherence. Design of a
multimodal Wizard-of-Oz experiment in three languages. Coordinating
MLE’s research activities with European and U.S. based
project partners. Managing a local team running multimodal
Wizard-of-Oz studies and planning multimodality approaches for the
FASiL user interface.
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08/2000 –
09/2001
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Computational Linguist
Agentscape AG, Berlin Germany
Designed a Natural Language Understanding
component for a customer relationship management platform ("CyMON",
"Flirtmaschine.de"). Lead its implementation by a team of interaction designers in Berlin and programmers in Romania.
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Awards and Grants | |
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2009
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First Prize, Predicting Cognitive Performance in Open-ended Dynamic Tasks - A Modeling Comparison Challenge
International Conference on Cognitive Modeling (ICCM-2009), Manchester, UK. |
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2009
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Best Paper Award, Behavior Representation in Modeling and Simulation Conference (BRIMS), Provo, Utah.
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2008
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Postdoctoral Fellowship (2 years) of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), at UC San Diego. (declined)
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2003
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Best Thesis Award of the Society for Computational Linguistics and Language Technology (years 2002/03), Germany
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Teaching | |
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08/2006–12/2007
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Teaching Assistant
School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Processing Natural and Formal Languages Computer Programming |
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09/2001 –
03/2002
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Instructor
Prof. Stede, Institute of Linguistics, University of Potsdam, Germany
Introduction to Web Design in Research
(2000)
Object-Oriented Design in C++ for Linguists (2001) Perl for Computational Linguistics (2002) |
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01/2000 –
07/2000
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Teaching
Assistant
Prof. Staudacher, Institute of Linguistics, University of Potsdam, Germany Introduction to Prolog Programming (2000) |
Research and Development Contracts | |
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10-12/2004
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Research
Associate
Human Communication Research Centre, University of Edinburgh |
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03/2002 –
04/2002
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Contract
Researcher
Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin, Germany Designed an
annotation interface for lexical information in large
corpora.
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02/1999 –
03/1999
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Research
Intern
Fraunhofer Institute of Computer Graphics, Darmstadt, Germany Assisted in Public Relations |
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1996 –
2001
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Freelance IT Consultant
and Software Developer
Developed Shareware
and custom-built applications.
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Professional Activities |
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01/2005 – 10/2006
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ACL SIGGEN -
Board
Special Interest Group Natural Language Generation of the Association for Computational Linguistics. |
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07-08/2004
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Visiting
Researcher
Speech Interfaces Group, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Media Laboratory, U.S. |
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12/2003
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Visiting
Researcher
Comptuer Science Dept., Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia |
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06/2002
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Conference
Chair
11thStudent Conference of Computational Linguistics (TaCoS), Potsdam, Germany |
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2001 –
2002
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Campaign for the
Computational Linguistics Program
Department of Linguistics, University of Potsdam |
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Member of the
Association for Computational Linguistics,
the Cognitive Science Society (CogSci) and the
Gesellschaft für Linguistische Datenverarbeitung.
Reviewer for
Int. J.
of Human Computer Studies, Int. J. of Computers and Applications, HLT-NAACL, CogSci, EuroCogSci, UIST, ICCM, EACL-SRW, ENLG
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Professional Career in Journalism |
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08/2001 –
08/2002
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Ran weekly radio show
about multimedia and internet culture. This station serves the
greater Berlin and Brandenburg area.
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07-09/1999
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Reported current
issues, business, news. (Zeitfunk and B5Aktuell)
Work samples: http://www.david-reitter.com/radio/ |
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07/1997
–
08/1998 |
Radio Journalist and Studio Manager
Radio Klinikfunk, Wiesbaden, Germany Editor and presenter (fulltime compensated community service at a small non-profit radio station). |
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1996 –
1997
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Freelance Newspaper
Reporter
Allgemeine Zeitung Mainz Reported local issues in a regional daily newspaper. |
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1996 –
1998
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Volunteer Manager of
Workshops and Summer Schools
Stiftung Politische und Christliche Jugendbildung Presented current issues to students, led discussions, organized workshops at a non-government organization. |
Technical Skills |
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Computer
Standards
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ACT-R, C, C++, Emacs/Elisp, Perl, Python, Prolog,
Perl, R, Lisp and the basics of UML, SQL, Java.
HTML, LaTeX, XML. Mac OS X, Windows, Linux |
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Languages
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German (near-native), English (near-native), French
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Publications |
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